The present invention relates generally to industrial machinery and more specifically to a parts washer system.
Industrial parts washers are commonly used to remove debris, such as machining burrs, grease and dirt, from metallic parts such as engine blocks and crankshafts. Two such conventional devices are disclosed in Canadian Patent No. 669,262 entitled “Washing Apparatus” which issued to Umbricht on Aug. 27, 1963, and United Kingdom Patent No. 817,851 entitled “Improvements in or Relating to Washing Apparatus” which was published on Aug. 6, 1959. Another known industrial parts washer is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 3,059,861 entitled “Adjustable Spray Nozzle Assembly” which issued to Umbricht et al. on Oct. 23, 1962, and is incorporated by reference herein. Many traditional industrial parts washers typically flow a cleaning liquid onto the part for a predetermined period of time regardless of how clean the part actually is and regardless of part-to-part variability. Thus, the historical worst case scenario is commonly used to define the future predetermined period for cleaning which often leads to a sometimes slower than necessary process even for parts which are relatively clean after the prior machining operations.
Other cleaning devices are known in different industries as disclosed, for example, in the following U.S. patent application and patents: US 2001/0015096 A1 entitled “Monitoring of Particulate Matter in Water Supply” which was published on Aug. 23, 2001; U.S. Pat. No. 5,647,386 entitled “Automatic Precision Cleaning Apparatus with Continuous On-Line Monitoring and Feedback” which issued to Kaiser on Jul. 15, 1997; and U.S. Pat. No. 5,560,060 entitled “System and Method for Adjusting the Operating Cycle of a Cleaning Appliance” which issued to Dausch et al. on Oct. 1, 1996; all of which are incorporated by reference herein. These conventional devices, however, appear to have little application in the industrial parts industry for cleaning machining burrs and manufacturing plant dirt, especially for large parts having long internal passageways.